Blue Firebird

Seresse parries the creature's clumsy attack, her sword singing with the impact. She looks down at the beast down mingled disgust and pity. The necromantic energies holding its body together and binding it to attack are failing, like a cord stretched to its breaking point—only to snap when Celeg delivers the killing blow. Seresse watches the beast fall with contempt. She wants more. Glancing to the yawning darkness of the mine, she knows more are coming. Seresse feels their presence, like cold drafts issuing up from deep underground. A part of her wants to wait, to face them in bloody, glorious hatred made manifest. Without realizing it, she takes several steps away from the platform, as if to intercept the approaching monsters. Or join them in the fetid darkness of their subterranean tomb....

Defense against the Dark (Rabbit) Arts!

F.I.G.H.T.

Seresse spares a glance toward her companion. One jackalope lunges, intending to gore her, and she parries the blow with the clattering ring of metal against bone. Spinning gracefully with the momentum, the elf scores a cut along the beast's hide. She draws back and raises her blade, dark ichor sizzling upon the glowing metal. "Celeg, I think we can handle them, but if the worst...take my sword and protect them. Agreed?" Seresse springs lightly to his side, brandishing her sword, prepared to do whatever it takes. "Would you prefer the platform?"

Lllllllleeeeeeeet's get ready to... checks dice ... edit: RRRUMBLLLLLLLLE!

This is my Fight roll.

Seresse wavers, torn between valor and pragmatism. She looks at Gert with pleading eyes, her decision made. While her own safety means nothing, seeing the others in danger is a wound that pierces more deeply than any blade or arrow. The sword hilt creaks in her fingers as she tightens her grip. Melisara's eyes widen, deep and blue and lit with terror, as spectral energies coil about her hands. "I'm sorry, Gert!" Seresse springs from the platform and lands in a nimble crouch, cloak fluttering softly down behind her. Ghostly hands reaching, clawing, leeching the warmth from her soft skin. The Elf charges into the fray, sword ablaze, desperately crashing into the monsters' ranks. "Go!" Seresse runs, screaming, tearing Melisara away from the cursed thing. "Hurry! Get out, Meli—!" She points frantically back at Gert and the platform before her sword clashes with the beast's antlers. Metal on bone rings in a symphony of life-or-death battle! "Get on the platform! Hurry!"

Seresse brings up the rearguard, fighting the urge to turn and face—join?—face the things behind them. She stops at the platform and turns, drawing her sword again. "I am sorry about the horns, Aron. Perhaps I can get you some...." But her voice is distant, her will not entirely her own. With a hiss of effort, the Elf pivots and joins them in heading for the exit platform. "It seems Orchibank the Old was onto something."

Athletics roll! (Never you mind the timestamp!)

🎵 Ah, push it! P-push it real good! 🎶

Seresse nods, sheathing her blade. "Thanks to your bravery." She looks at the warrior for a long moment. "We are lucky it is so." The sound of other things crawling up from the abyss draws her attention. "That luck may not hold long. Let's be hasty." But the Elf does not turn to flee. Instead, she runs to the dire rabbit's carcass and sets her shoulder against it, straining, her shoes scraping on the stone.

Seresse glanced sidelong at Gert before raising her sword above her head. The blade shines with a silvery-blue light, like the ray of a star taken the form of a single leaf upon the branch held aloft. The pallor it casts upon her features makes the Elf seem ghostly, a memory given shape, or perhaps a shade of the past. But she is no memory, and the strength of her sword-arm is more than just a phantom. Desperation drives her to hew the foul beast, hoping to separate its head from its neck. The sound of another menace fuels her desperation, and the others are now trapped. If swords won't work, she has only one other option. The blade bites deep, cleaving undead sinew, bone, and tendon, leaving naught but scraps of flesh holding the skull to the neck. "Hrmph." Seresse flicks her blade to clear of it of the thing's black blood.

Duck season! I'm going to try something: hitting it really hard! It's bold, it's new, but it might just win us this fight...

"Ai!" Seresse cries out as the monster turns its hideous appetite for warm flesh and blood on Celeg! Unwilling to watch it happen, she charges the beast with a war cry, her sword glinting with frosty light as she drives it into the beast's hide.

Slow and undeady wins the race, Br'er Rabbit!